Ashes, Beauty, and Rabbit Trails

Currently I’m reading #YouAreaPrizetobeWon by #WendyGriffith. Although it is written for single women, I, a happily married one, am enjoying it very much. I just read this sentence: "Jesus promises to turn our ashes that seem to have no value into something so beautiful that we won't believe our eyes." Suddenly my thoughts are piqued and I find myself racing down a glorious rabbit trail.

Here's where the Holy Spirit immediately took my thoughts: Ashes. No value? Not really. But in the old days they were used for making soap. How? With just the addition of water to hardwood ash, lye was produced (it is extremely caustic), which when added to oil (or fat) caused a chemical reaction called saponification.

The process produces just two components: soap and glycerine, the first, obviously, a cleanser and the second, a humectant—a substance that attracts moisture from our surroundings and prevents dryness. A natural, healthy soap has the glycerine still in it, like the gentle soap I use, which contains only saponified olive oil, water, and sea salt. Yes, lye is nasty on its own, but when the correct proportions of lye and oil are used, there is no lye left after saponification.

We know that the Lord has promised to give us "beauty for ashes," and this of course is what the author is referring to in the quote above. But not all ashes turn to beauty; only those that are submitted to God. The ashes of our lives, watered only with our self-pitying tears, leave us with a caustic, damaging mess. But when the Holy Spirit is invited to pour His oil into our mess, a spiritual saponification occurs and we find ourselves both cleansed and softened. I speculate that there is a “glycerine factor” here as well that protects us from future spiritual dryness.

Reading here and there online about ashes and oil, I stumble across something interesting: 

The ritual of applying a mark to the forehead of palm ash and oil on Ash Wednesday marks the beginning of the season of Lent for many Christian faiths. The mark is an outward sign of the believer's repentance and commitment to renewal of their faith.

Ahh. Ash Wednesday. Always wondered why they called it that.

In Numbers 19:17-18, we find a ceremonial use for ashes: 

To remove the defilement, put some of the ashes from the burnt purification offering in a jar, and pour fresh water over them. [They’re making lye here!] Then someone who is ceremonially clean must take a hyssop branch and dip it into the water. That person must sprinkle the water on the tent, on all the furnishings in the tent, and on the people ….” [I hope they kept it well diluted!] 

I wonder if this use of hyssop is what King David was referring to in Psalm 51, “regarding the time Nathan the prophet came to him after David had committed adultery with Bathsheba”:

Have mercy upon me, O God.… Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin…. Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean: wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow. 

Bringing it into the New Testament, Hebrews 9:13 asks a rhetorical question: “If the blood of bulls and goats and the ashes of a heifer could cleanse the body from ceremonial impurity, how much more can the blood of Christ cleanse the conscience?”

It was the prophet Isaiah who foretold that the Christ, when He came, would give us “beauty for ashes” (Isaiah 61). The fulfillment of this prophecy was declared in Luke 4 on an occasion when Jesus was visiting Nazareth, his boyhood home. 

He went into the synagogue on the sabbath day, and stood up for to read. And there was delivered unto him the book [or scroll] of the prophet Esaias [Isaiah]. And when he had opened the book, he found the place where it was written, The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the broken-hearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, to preach the acceptable year of the Lord.

And he closed the book, and he gave it again to the minister, and sat down. And the eyes of all them that were in the synagogue were fastened on him. [Imagine the expectant silence that hung there. No one moved a muscle, and every eye was on Jesus.]

And he [said] unto them, This day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears.

Make no mistake. Even though he stopped—mid-sentence—after little more than a verse of Isaiah 61, and even though He didn’t actually quote the “beauty for ashes” bit, that part was also fulfilled. [In the Gospels and the Book of Acts alone, there are over 40 references to Jesus fulfilling what was written about Him in the scriptures, the law, and the prophets.]

So the Spirit of the Lord was also upon Jesus to deliver the promises from Isaiah 61:2c-3:

To comfort all that mourn; to appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that he might be glorified.

The only thing that prevents the fulfilling of these grand promises in our own lives is our failure to simply reach out with our faith and receive them. Go ahead. Give Him all your ashes. Bring Him your mourning and expect Him to pour out His oil of joy on you. Throw off the heavy spirit of discouragement, and by an act of your will, sing praise to Him. Lay hold of His Holy Spirit, and you, too, will ultimately become like a solid and beautiful tree, standing for what is right, planted by God Himself and bringing glory to Him.

And the only thing I’m left wondering is, after hiking so far down this rabbit trail, why do I still feel like I need to get up and get some exercise? 

** If you like it, please share it! **

The Chapter I Didn’t Want to Read

Recently I was watching a Joyce Meyer sermon on YouTube and was reminded of how much she loves the Amplified Bible. For the span of many years, it was my favourite as well, as my broken-down old copy attests. Now with this woman of God highlighting the richness and scope of the text, I told myself that I would begin reading that version again. Because at this time I am plowing slowly through the Old Testament in The Message, I determined that I would start the Amplified at the beginning of the New.

The next time I sat down for some quiet time with God, I opened the tattered old red volume to the first chapter of Matthew. Oh right, I groaned inwardly with a certain amount of disappointment, the genealogy. I really did not feel like starting my reading this morning with the long list of names outlining Jesus’ human ancestry from Abraham all the way to His birth. Oh God, this is so boring. Sorry, but I’m just going to skip it. Besides, I spent all that time a year ago poring over these lists and learning things from it in that study I was leading. I really don’t think there’s anything here for me this morning.

God seemed to nudge me to just glance over the names. Hmm.  ^“Judah the father of Perez and Zerah, whose mother was Tamar…” Now there is a man of rather questionable character for God to have allowed him a place in Christ’s bloodline.

In spite of the precedent set against intermarriage by his great-grandfather Abraham, who determined that his son Isaac, “the son of the promise,” would marry within the family (Genesis 24:1-4), Judah married a Canaanite woman. (The Canaanites were descendants of Ham, whose entire lineage God had cursed.) Judah and his wife had three sons. When the oldest, Er, was of age, Judah gave him in marriage to Tamar, a Shechemite, but somehow Er ticked off God so severely that “He slew him.” Yikes.

Then Judah said to Er’s brother Onan, “Go and marry Tamar, as our law requires of the brother of a man who has died. You must produce an heir for your brother” (Genesis 38:8, NLT). Onan had his jollies with Tamar, but he defied God in the matter of raising up an heir for his dead brother: he “spilled his seed on the ground.” So God killed him too. Yikes again. This is serious business.

With all the violent acts that had already been committed by man, beginning with Cain murdering Abel—yet still without God’s direct intervention, I couldn’t help but wonder what was so over-the-top wicked in the hearts and lives of these two brothers that God Himself cut their lives short.

Judah had one more son, but he was terrified of losing him as well, so he kept stalling on the third marriage. Years went by; Tamar finally realized it wasn’t going to happen. Determined to produce an heir, she disguised herself as a prostitute, covering her face with a veil, and lured in her father-in-law. She demanded that he leave her with his staff and seal until he sent payment. Then she disappeared.

Another random thought occurred to me: It’s quite amazing that Tamar, who produced no child in her first marriage, conceived not only an heir but twins in a one-night stand with her father-in-law. She certainly had no problem with fertility. It makes me wonder if perhaps her first husband also withheld his seed from her. Maybe God killed both brothers for the same transgression.

When word gets around that Tamar has been “playing the harlot” and is pregnant, Judah is furious and demands that she be burned. But she produces his staff and seal, exposes his hypocrisy, and he admits, “She is more righteous than I.”

Continuing on the same theme of less-than-stellar characters in the lineage of Christ, my attention is drawn down the list of names in the chapter to Rahab. Most of us know that she was a Canaanite prostitute, living in Jericho when Joshua sent two spies ahead to check out the lay of the land. Suddenly I found myself wondering, with a wry smile, how it happened that the two spies ended up in the house of a prostitute. Probably for the usual reason. Not checking out the city so much as checking out the women. However, their encounter with Rahab did establish one very important thing: she told them that the fear of the Israelites’ God had fallen on the whole community. God’s reputation had preceded them, and the hearts of the Jerichoans had melted in fear. Rahab confessed that she believed the Israelites’ God was the one true God, and she made a pact with the spies: their safety for hers and that of her family.

So Rahab and her family joined the Israelites after the city was destroyed, the only survivors. She went on to marry Salmon and gave birth to Boaz. That she continued to embrace faith in God is evidenced by the character of the son she raised, as compared to those other half-breed Canaanites Er and Onan. In the book of Ruth we see how Boaz treated his workers. When he first arrives on the scene, returned from a trip to Bethlehem, he calls out to the reapers, “The Lord be with you!” And they answer him, “The Lord bless you!” Obviously a loving and well-loved employer. And his concern for Ruth’s safety and well-being, this displaced Moabite who has come to glean leftover grain from his fields, shows his charity and compassion. The rest of that short book affirms Boaz’s respect for God’s law and his reflection of God’s character.

Eventually he marries Ruth, bringing another foreigner into the bloodline, but a foreigner who has embraced Israel and their God: “Your people shall be my people, and your God shall be my God” (Ruth 1:16). As always, it’s faith that counts with God, not where we’ve come from or what we’ve done.

It was faith—and humility—in David that garnered him such favour with God. In spite of his adulterous relationship with Bathsheba and then his murder of her husband, when he is confronted with his transgression he exhibits a broken and contrite heart. This is of great worth in the sight of God.

Something else that strikes me as I look at David’s name in the genealogy, he is called “King David” here. The next fourteen descendants in Christ’s line were all kings, but none of them is called that in this list: only David. He really was very special to God. Interesting, too, that God chose for the lineage to go through Bathsheba, which shows to me the irrevocable grace and redemption that God extends to the penitent heart. This marriage, entered into so unrighteously, still by repentance and faith received God’s abiding blessing.

These are the thoughts that flit through my mind in the first few moments of glancing at the onerous list of names in the chapter that I didn’t want to read. It encourages me that none of us is disqualified from our destiny with God by seasons of bad behaviour. He didn’t hesitate to include these characters in the ancestry of Christ. Even Jesus Himself (as Hebrews 2:11 tells us) “is not ashamed to call us his brothers.”

** If you like it, please share it! **

Hidden Treasure

God drew me to something really amazing in His Word on Saturday. Even how He got me there gave evidence of His precise timing: a few seconds difference and I would have missed it. I was busy with garden produce in the kitchen. At the same time, I was feeling a deep need to be edified in my spirit and to be in an attitude of worship before God. I rarely listen to music, but I suddenly decided to go to Google and type in “YouTube hymns.” I would listen to some of the old-time hymns and allow them to carry me into a deeper awareness of God’s continual presence.

Soon I was back at my work, now with my kitchen full of grand choir music. I’d probably been back at my work an hour when the phone rang. I hurried into my office and hit “pause” so that I could hear whoever was calling. I can’t even remember who called, whether it was a telemarketer or my own dear husband—what followed so carried me away that everything else was forgotten.

I returned to my desk intending to click “play” again. The particular link I had selected had a playing time of two hours. There were various graphics streaming with the music, changing every minute or so. Not yet having turned it back on, my attention was caught by what was frozen on the screen. It looked like the back of a CD cover, about that size and those dimensions. It was green and just had some plain text on it. The word “genealogy” jumped out at me. This was interesting: God and I have had a private joke lately about genealogies, because I told Him one morning a while back as my Bible reading brought me upon the long list of “begats” at the beginning of Matthew that it was boring and I didn’t really feel like plowing through it this time. He immediately began to show me very much the contrary. Ever since, it seems He has taken every opportunity to give me a little good-humoured dig about the riches that are buried in such unlikely places.

The title read, “The Gospel in Genesis 5 – Genealogy.” The text read as follows: 

Did you know that the gospel message is contained in the genealogy from Adam to Noah that we find in Genesis Chapter 5? In the list below, I have included the Hebrew names from the genealogy along with their English meanings. This is incredible…
Adam (Man)Seth (Appointed)Enosh (Mortal)Kenan (Sorrow)Mahalalel (The Blessed God)Jared (Shall come down)Enoch (Teaching)Methuselah (His death shall bring)Lamech (The despairing)Noah (Rest or Comfort)       If you put it all together, you get a sentence that reads something like this: “Man is appointed mortal sorrow, but the Blessed God shall come down teaching, and his death shall bring the despairing rest.”

Wow. I was so astounded, so moved, all I could do for the first few minutes was sit there and worship God, tell Him how amazing He is. How I wished that there was a reference on the graphic so I could check out the source. I wanted to know who had discovered this, and certainly to give credit where it was due.

Then, my vegetables completely abandoned, I grabbed my big old Strong’s Concordance and started double-checking the meanings of these names. The first three names checked out, but I ran into a glitch with Kenan (or Cainan). Strong’s said it meant “fixed”; also “an antediluvian,” meaning “before the Flood.” Now that in itself would be crazy: this was still six generations before the Flood. Nobody knew that it was going to happen, except God. So back then if someone named their kid “Before the Flood,” it was directly inspired by God, like all the other names in this list seem to be.

But it troubled me that this meaning for Kenan didn’t match. I hoped that someone hadn’t just tried too hard to see what they hoped to see in this passage. Was there possibly another source I could find, for the meanings of Biblical names, that would give me a second opinion? I googled “Bible: Kenan means sorrow,” and bingo, I found myself at the site of the man who had written the original article, over 20 years ago, from which this except had been taken. His name is Chuck Missler, and I found him at http://www.khouse.org/articles/1996/44/. He explained, to my satisfaction, some things about finding the meanings of these old names, passed down orally for centuries before they were ever written down by Moses.

In his summary, he also made this general comment: “The Bible is an integrated message system, the product of supernatural engineering. Every number, every place name, every detail, every jot and tittle is there for our learning, our discovery, and our amazement. Truly, our God is an awesome God.”

Truly He is.

What were the chances of the phone ringing and causing me to pause the video on that particular screen shot, smack in the middle of more that two hours of streaming? I went back to the YouTube hymns to discover exactly how long that image was on my screen. Just 45 seconds. 

You Must Be Born Again

There was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews (John 3:1, KJV).

As I climbed out of bed early this morning, I thought of Nicodemus coming to Jesus in the dead of night. He’d been curious to have a face-to-face discussion with Jesus, but as a respectable Pharisee, he couldn’t be seen seriously engaging with the controversial figure in the light of day. “Master,” he says, “everyone knows that you are a teacher sent from God.” (“What you speak is profound. I’m all ears. Lay some truth on me!”)

To which Jesus replies, “Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.”

Nicodemus asks him what exactly he means by being born again: “Can a man go back into his mother’s womb and make a new entrance into the world—make a fresh start in that way?”

Jesus just repeats Himself, expanding on His theme a little by saying that there are two different kinds of birth: one of the flesh and one of the spirit, and that a person must go through both before being able to enter the kingdom of God.

Way back when I was a new Christian (forty years ago now!), I thought this referred exclusively to what happens when we die: If we’ve experienced the second birth by receiving Christ into our lives, then we’ll be assured of going to heaven when this life is over. However, I now see most of the talk about the afterlife as an afterthought: it’s not the main deal, at least not at this point in time. What Jesus is really focussing on in this passage is the here and now: If a person is born again by the Spirit of God, he is able to see, perceive, appreciate, understand, and benefit from the reach and reign and resources of God’s kingdom, on earth as it is in heaven, from this moment forward, all the way through death and beyond.

These musings about seeing and perceiving the things of the Spirit now take my thoughts to one of my favourite scriptures, found in 1 Corinthians 2. Verse 14 says, “But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned” (KJV). In other words, the natural man, the one who has only experienced the first, physical birth, the one who has not yet been regenerated by the Spirit of Christ, cannot understand the things of God. He simply doesn’t have the necessary software. Or translated into another metaphor, you hear people around you talking about Netflix and the wealth of entertainment and education available through it, but until you subscribe to it yourself, pay for your membership (oh, wait a minute: Jesus has already paid all the membership fees), and accept the terms and conditions (submitting your heart to Christ and making Him the boss of your life), you’re not going to be able to get all that good stuff streaming into your living room.

To the one who is not born again, the things of God are out of reach and beyond the understanding. He may even mock them, because “they are foolishness unto him.”

Many people have a basic belief in God and they turn to him in times of trouble. But it's one thing to reach out to God for help and comfort when we are in a tight spot; it's quite another to yield oneself to His dominion, to bow our knee and our heart to the Lordship of Jesus Christ. This is where a changed life begins.

No one can change his own life. God asks, “Can the leopard change his spots?” No. What we were born into and what we grew up in has moulded us indelibly. We can make superficial changes, we can set our will to behave differently, but there are deep influences that keep seeping through, like an old, oily stain into a fresh new coat of paint. Trying to change yourself has been called pulling yourself up by your own bootstraps. Picture that for a moment. You can pull as hard as you like on those tabs on the sides of your cowboy boots; you can strain until you’re exhausted, but you won’t elevate yourself one centimetre, physically or spiritually, off the earthly plane you were born and raised on. It will take someone separate from you to lift you up. This is what God offers. “Humble yourself in the presence of the Lord, and He will lift you up and make your life significant” (James 4:10, see AMP).

Another verse in that Corinthians passage tells us that just as only a person’s own spirit can really perceive and know the things that are deep in that person’s heart and mind, so only God’s Spirit can know the things that are in the mind and heart of God (1 Corinthians 2:11). Read that again and think about it. Yes, we would have to agree that this is true. But the next verse brings in a revolutionary new thought: We have been given God’s Spirit! We have the software to perceive the very things that are in the mind and heart of God! Those of us who have yielded to the Lordship of Christ and are consequently born again, “we have received God’s Spirit …, so we can know the wonderful things God has freely given us” (v. 12, NLT).

This is what Jesus was offering to Nicodemus: “Be born again, and then you will be able to see (know, be acquainted with, and experience—AMPC) the kingdom of God.”

But to as many as did receive and welcome Him, He gave the authority (power, privilege, right) to become the children of God, that is, to those who believe in (adhere to, trust in, and rely on) His name (John 1:12, AMPC).

Consider Yourself (Not!)

For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit (Romans 8:5, KJV).

As I came down the stairs early this morning, I found myself thinking about something that happened 35 years ago. I was working with Youth for Christ, and for our weekly staff meeting that Monday morning, I had been asked to bring the devotional.

I spoke on the subject of sin, some thoughts originally inspired by a reading from Oswald Chambers’ My Utmost for His Highest. Although I cannot find that reading now, I recall that it directed me to Matthew 16, where Peter has the glorious revelation, “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.” Jesus calls him blessed, saying that flesh and blood—his human capacities—have not revealed this to him, but that it is a realization directly imparted by God.

However, moments later, Jesus explains to His disciples how he must suffer and die, and Peter reacts strongly: “Be it far from thee, Lord, this shall never be!” I remember that the margin notes of the King James Bible I had back then translated “Be it far from thee!” as “Pity thyself!” Oswald Chambers brought out the same meaning, and he described this response as the epitome of sin. (The 1599 Geneva Bible translates it this way, and as well, many scholars agree that these words, “pity thyself,” well express the original meaning.)

So I delivered my devotional based on these thoughts along with some of my own experiences and conclusions, and when I finished, there was silence in this serious group of Bible college graduates. The Executive Director was staring intently at me, the baby Christian; then he said, “That’s the best definition of sin I’ve ever heard.”

Even this morning, I remembered the flush of pleasure I felt back then at his praise. But more than that, the recollection caused me to consider the subject of that devotional, the continual human preoccupation with self, self-interest, self-preservation.

I put my porridge on to cook and sat down to some quiet time with God. I have been reading a book by Ellen G. White, an important figure in the Seventh Day Adventist Church. Her writings are controversial, but I allow them to inspire me, whilst continually weighing them in the light of God’s word. I would describe them as part scripture, part extrapolation, part commentary, and part historic fiction based on a solid knowledge of the Bible.

Picking up where I’d left off in her book, Desire of Ages, I found myself reading on the subject of John the Baptist and how his disciples became jealous of Jesus as His ministry began to grow. “Rabbi, He that was with thee beyond Jordan, to whom thou bearest witness, behold, the same baptizeth, and all men come to Him.” Ellen White points out that Satan was taking opportunity to tempt John with protecting his own ministry. It certainly would have been an understandable, human response. But John set his will hard against the temptation: “He must increase, but I must decrease” (John 3:30).

She goes on to say this: “If he [John] had sympathized with himself, and expressed grief or disappointment at being superseded, he would have sown the seeds of dissension, would have encouraged envy and jealousy, and would seriously have impeded the progress of the gospel.”

“If he had sympathized with himself ….” Amazing! Here was the same subject that I’d been perusing a few minutes earlier as I came down the stairs: “Pity thyself!”

Whenever we are tempted to look out for our own interests instead of cleaving to God and resting in Him, it might be time to command, “Get behind me, Satan!” After rebuking the devil, Jesus told Peter (according to various versions), “You are an offence to me, a stumbling block. You are tempting me to sin. You are not helping me; you are in my way. You are a hindrance and a snare to me. You stand right in my path, Peter, when you look at things from man’s point of view and not from God’s.”

Ouch! Moments earlier, the Master had praised him for his God-given revelation. Now He is as much as saying, “Dear Peter, you are totally in the flesh.”

Something else occurs to me here: I think that when Jesus praised him for his discernment, Peter got a little bit puffed up. He felt like he was the man of the hour, the guy with a word in season; and in the rush of pride, he became presumptuous.

We’re like that too. It’s another manifestation of our self-centredness. And so our most exalted moments can degrade quickly into some of our most humiliating.

Pride goes … before a fall (Proverbs 16:18, NKJV).

Strength for the Day

Melissa moved to Calgary a few months ago to begin a Master of Architecture program at the U of C. As the first term winds down, the crazy pace has intensified and she told us that for the next while she will be living right at the school, sleeping on a couch and budgeting her time for five hours of sleep a night.

I sent her some encouraging words the other morning, blessing her with strength, confidence, and peace. She texted back saying that she would have a fifteen-minute bus ride shortly and that we could have a chat on the phone. In our conversation, I shared three scriptures, which then reminded me of an article I wrote about fifteen years ago. I told her I would find the article and email it to her.

Reading about that day-in-the-life was like looking at an old snapshot of another life, but the words are as true today—and as relevant—as they were then.

This is the day which the Lord hath made; we will rejoice and be glad in it (Psalm 118:24).

Life is so busy lately. And I’ve been running short on sleep, which doesn’t help. Last night Greg and I didn’t get settled until 12:30—again. Then he woke up at 5:30 a.m., and although he was trying to be very quiet about opening his current book or his Bible or whatever it was, I woke up too. Sometimes I can put the pillow over my head and sleep on, but this time I could tell right away that my brain was up and running for the day.

I peeked out at the morning. Brilliant blue sky. It was gorgeous. But as I viewed my day from where I lay, it didn’t look so appealing. Once I got the kids out the door to school, there would be a quick scramble of duties before I left for my singing lesson. I didn’t have enough energy even to put my heart into my singing. And I really needed to work out this morning, but my limbs felt like deadwood. How would I muster the strength? And the remainder of the day was a maze of commitments, finishing with year-end ceremonies at the girls’ school. It would be another late night.

I found myself staring into the familiar face of a long-time acquaintance: discouragement. I wouldn’t exactly say that he’s a friend, but I have spent a lot of time with him over the years. And in all those times with him, I can’t say that I remember ever once having any fun. I turned away from his dark face and looked into the face of the Lord.

“This is the day that the Lord has made,” I found myself saying aloud. “I will rejoice and be glad in it.” I never much cared for that quote. It was mercilessly butchered in a simplistic chorus, sung over and over in churches when I was a new Christian. It spoke to me of a superficial joy in a newly discovered God, a joy based on pleasant circumstances, utterly untested by the true facts of life. But now suddenly this verse was resurrected from its lowly status and infused with new life. This is the day that God has specially designed for me to live today, I thought. In His wisdom and goodness He has deemed that I face this day, full of commitments and challenges, with a tired body, fortified by only five hours of sleep. Because I trust Him, I will rejoice and be glad in it.

And so I began my day, choosing to rejoice in the Lord. As the morning progressed and my thoughts mused on God and His Word, another verse connected itself to the first: “The joy of the Lord is your strength ” (Nehemiah 8:10). Hmmm. Another seemingly trite verse (God forbid that I actually say anything in His Word is trite!) from another silly song reminiscent of my early salvation. But see now how it ties in with the other verse: If I choose to rejoice in the Lord in this difficult day, I will find strength from Him.

Now the little concordance in my brain, of its own volition, took a key word from each of those two verses and went searching for a verse that would tie the loose ends together. Day, strength. Day, strength . . . What was that verse hovering on the edge of my memory? And then it popped up on my mental screen: “As thy days, so shall thy strength be” (Deuteronomy 33:25b). Whatever kind of day I face, God will see to it that I have the strength to match it.

I see, Lord. As I face my day, I choose to rejoice in You. That joy will be the source of the strength I need. And the strength You give me will be sufficient to meet whatever You bring me in the course of this day.

Well, it was a good day. And I even found an hour free to lie down, but I was physically over-tired and I only dozed fitfully. I felt much worse when I got back up. Again discouragement came knocking as I sat on the edge of the bed, trying to clear my foggy brain.

I remembered the Lord’s teaching from earlier in the day. Determinedly I chose to speak out the Word of God. But this is how it came out: “This is the Lord that the day has made . . .” and my voice trailed off with a little laugh as I realized my error.

And then I thought a bit more about what I’d inadvertently said. How often do we make that error? We allow the kind of day we’re having to determine how big our God is. We reduce the Lord to the stature of the day. The day becomes the measure of our God, instead of the other way around.

The Lord thy God in the midst of thee is mighty! (Zephaniah 3:17a). Blessed is the man whose strength is in thee (Psalm 84:5a).

Take No Thought

Being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus. (Philippians 1:6)

 

Our daughter Melissa is quickly nearing the end of a four-month internship in Washington, DC. It has suddenly come to my remembrance that I started writing an article when she first arrived there, which I always meant to get back to and finish and send to her. Here it is, now or never.

She and I were exchanging a few light texts one evening when she abruptly changed the subject. She said her insecurities were flaring up; she was over-thinking things, putting certain expectations on herself. Many of the stresses she wrestles with fit under the heading of what she calls “people pleasing.” Her thoughts were running away with her and she couldn’t seem to stop them.

I see an unfortunate similarity with her mother in the area of runaway thoughts, unconscious and undisciplined thinking, and I find myself hoping that she will get free of these things a lot sooner than I have.

“Hey dear,” I texted, “I wish I could help you stop your busy mind …”

Then I thought of something that Jesus said several times in His earthly ministry, and that He has said several times to me personally over the years.

I continued: “I think Jesus would say, ‘Take no thought.’ Think of it as a command.”

I paused and thought and then texted on:

“So when you catch yourself ‘taking a thought,’ repent—that means change your mind!—and put it back where you got it.”

If we take something we’ve been told not to take, especially if it’s God and His Son who have told us not to take it, well, we’re obviously moving in the wrong direction.

I glanced at my watch. It was a little after 9:30 p.m. That made it nigh on to midnight where she was. I hoped she’d get to bed soon and not start doing a Bible study at this very moment; nevertheless I made a suggestion:

“Do a search in the King James Version for ‘take no thought,’ and I think you’ll see the kind of things he doesn’t want us clogging our minds with. He implies that it’s the antithesis of faith. Rest and peace on you, my dear girl, body and soul.”

She thanked me for my words and said she would look it up in the morning. Then she added, “Plus I realize that I didn’t spend quality time with God this morn. Still trying to get a routine and a place to have my quiet/rest-in-Him time.”

Of course. Jesus, toward the end of all his advice on taking no thought, gives that very antidote: “But seek first the kingdom of God and His way of living—and He’ll see that everything else is looked after.” (Matthew 6:33, paraphrase)

It must be hard for Melissa to carve out that space for seeking God, I thought, just settling into this internship in DC, sharing living quarters with several other young women and a bedroom with one of them. It’s hard enough for me to find that time in the midst of my own busyness, even with all the freedoms my current status in life affords. The empty nest and all that.

I looked it up for myself in the morning—“Take no thought.”

The first twenty-four verses of Matthew 6 are all about learning to choose God’s opinion, God’s approval, God’s kingdom, over the opinions, approvals, and dominions of this world and its people. We are called to love and serve others, but we can’t even do that freely when we’re caught up in what they think of us. It comes down to letting go of our reputation so we’re free to move in God’s rhythms.

Then at verse 24 begin the “take no thoughts.” “Take no thought for your life, what you will eat, what you will drink, what your body looks like and what you will put on it. Your father will look after all of that.”

“Take no thought about how tall you are or about how many years you will live. You have no control over that, but God does.”

A little further along, Jesus reiterates. (Repetition speaks of emphasis.) “Therefore take no thought—and waste no words talking—about what you’ll eat or drink or dress yourself in. Those who don’t trust God worry about these things, but this kind of preoccupation is not appropriate for a child of God.”

I had texted Melissa to consider “Take no thought” as a command. Perhaps I didn’t choose the word carefully enough. Some Christians are fond of saying, “It’s a command, not a suggestion.” It’s a way of manipulating, trying to force people to comply with God’s instruction. It quickly brings bondage. But God’s instruction is meant to bring liberty—in this case, freedom from the worries that preoccupy most of us. “Instead,” He says, “focus on my kingdom. Get preoccupied with that. God will keep that person in perfect peace who steadies his mind on God and His interests. Oh, and then, by the way, God will look after all those other things you used to worry about.” (Isaiah 26:3, Matthew 6:33)

The chapter ends with another exhortation about our thought life: “Take no thought for tomorrow. Tomorrow will look after itself. There are enough challenges today in which you will have opportunity to test your faith to the limit.”

I like what The Message version says in this chapter, in the part where Jesus instructs us to consider the state of the birds, blithely living under God’s provision: “Look at the birds, free and unfettered, ... careless in the care of God.” Not careless as in sloppy, but as in without a care in the world. It reminds me to cast all my cares upon the One who cares for me. (1 Peter 5:7)

“What I’m trying to do here,” The Message continues, “is to get you to relax, to not be so preoccupied with getting, so you can respond to God’s giving....” Getting may make us think of materialism, being enamoured with the goods of this world, but getting is broader than that. In my case, my most obsessive desire for getting has to do with getting things done, and this is always a struggle of my own fleshly effort. God, meanwhile, is continually trying to give me something: His peace.

Further from The Message (6:33 again): “Steep your life in God-reality, God-initiative, God-provisions. Don’t worry about missing out. You’ll find all your everyday human concerns will be met.”

There is another final “take no thought” a few chapters farther along. It refers specifically to times of intense persecution when Christians will be hauled up before authorities, but the exhortation and promise given here cover us in any situation where we are put on the spot to speak. As a daily discipline and delight, let us learn to listen for God’s prompting and only speak those things we hear Him speaking. “Take no thought,” says Jesus, “how or what ye shall speak: for it shall be given you in that same hour what ye shall speak.  For it is not ye that speak, but the Spirit of your Father which speaketh in you (Matthew 10:19-20, KJV).

 

Will not God, who gave his son, freely give you all things? (Romans 8:32, paraphrase)